Christians have over the centuries maintained a dialogue with God, the Bible in their hands, whereby God speaks and the believer listens, and a deep relationship is nurtured. The technical and historical term for this way of reading the Bible and praying the Word of God, ‘lectio divina’ or ‘holy reading’, would not be recognised by many today who practise it faithfully in their life of prayer. Père Dumont traces the history of ‘lectio divina’, focussing on its primary and fundamental meaning: the Bible read and received as ‘a word coming from the mouth of God’.